


when things start changing (we'll be changing with them)

by a_secondhand_sorrow



Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Evan is Soft, F/M, Flower Crowns, Fluff, Graduation Fic, So Will I by Ben Platt inspired this whole thing, other characters are mentioned but not in it, thanks ben, they are in love sorry I don't make the rules, they cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-25
Updated: 2020-05-25
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:28:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24376531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_secondhand_sorrow/pseuds/a_secondhand_sorrow
Summary: The night of her graduation, Zoe steps into her backyard and is greeted with the sight of her boyfriend sitting at the base of a tree, sprawled out onto the grass as though he was designed to be there.
Relationships: Evan Hansen/Zoe Murphy
Comments: 8
Kudos: 19





	when things start changing (we'll be changing with them)

**Author's Note:**

> listen to [so will i](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VjDNOJHQ3g) by ben platt for maximum effect

The night of her graduation, Zoe steps into her backyard and is greeted with the sight of her boyfriend sitting at the base of a tree, eagerly demonstrating to her little cousin how to fold the dandelions sprouting around the base of the tree into a proper flower crown. 

She can’t help the smile that comes to her face at the sight of him, sprawled out onto the grass as though he were designed to be there. Zoe has seen Evan Hansen in almost any scenario: folded into chairs, cross-legged on harsh tile, standing in a crowd and by himself and tucked neatly by her side. She considers herself well-versed in the many ways he can occupy a space. It’s something she prides herself on, her general knowledge of him and how he may look in any given scenario. There’s something so beautiful about the way he exists - even though it can be cramped, contained, and achingly hopeful that he’ll just be ignored, she can see the beauty even in those moments. And when he unfolds it’s even better. When he sits up a little straighter, lets his legs rest unlocked, and his hands - moving even when completely relaxed - make slower, more confident journeys around their surroundings, she’s reminded of just how far he’s come from the anxious senior tripping over his own thoughts every time he opened his mouth in the course of two school years. 

From where he lays sprawled on the grass, he looks almost relaxed. The grass doesn’t seem to bother him, and his legs are crossed gently with one foot under his right knee while he leans over, his always-moving hands quick and gentle over the stems of the dandelions. She can hear snippets of his words, quick and defined but still somehow low and soothing. He’s actually a very good storyteller, especially around little kids. By the sharp giggles that float over her mom’s gardenias and the stone patio pavement to greet her, he’s pulled out his skills to wax poetic on the method. 

In one fluid motion (and wow, she never thought she’d be using the word  _ fluid  _ to describe any movement Evan Hansen made) he twists off the crown and drops it onto the little boy’s head. For a moment, the light caught by the dandelions seems to radiate through the kid, and she can only stare while he hops up and runs off to boast to the other kids, who are playing on the old, creaky swing set. Evan watches him run, the amusement and gentleness on his face fading so slowly a person less versed in Evan Hansen wouldn’t have even noticed. His eyebrows furrowed, meeting to deepen the crease in his forehead, and her stomach dropped with his hand’s descent to trail at his shirt hem, twisting and pulling in his constant, quiet gesture of anxiety. Before she tells her legs to move, she’s already across the patio and halfway to where Evan sits. Her footsteps are nearly silent in the cushioned grass, but Evan’s eyes turn to her before she can fully reach him anyway as though he could feel her nearby. Automatically, she feels her lips curl into a grin, one that his gaze lingers on for a moment; she’d applied a new, slightly darker lipstick for the occasion, redder for spring and for graduating and for the yellow sundress she also donned, and she knows that he thoroughly enjoys the novelty of it just as he seems to enjoy her in all forms. 

She sinks to sit next to him, indifferent to her dress, letting her legs cross at the ankle stretched out in front of her. “That’s cute,” she says, by way of greeting. 

The responding shrug is felt against her shoulder, where the fabrics of their respective tops snag a little with Evan’s movement. “It’s easy. Little kids are cute, so whatever you give them is cute too.”

“Tarantulas? Scissors? Stomach flu?”

“I...yeah,” he mutters, and she laughs. “I guess those aren’t so cute.”

“You’re right, though. Mostly. They are cute.” She turns her head away from her cousins and looks to his face in profile. The summer sun seems to soak into the smooth brown skin stretched over his cheeks, and he blinks quickly. “I didn’t know you could make flower crowns.”

“I am a man of many talents.”

“Hidden depths, as they say.”

“Like an onion,” Evan lets his head drop so his cheek rests on the top of her head. 

“An apt metaphor. All of those onions lying around with their depth, no layers to be found. Point to the writer for the fantastic metaphor.”

He laughs, but it’s a little weak. When he responds, his voice is low. “Shrek has me mixing up my metaphors.”

“Well, that’s obvious,” she murmurs back. She drops a hand to his thigh, warm even through his jeans. “What’s up?”

He shrugs again. “Parties just - they aren’t really my crowd.” And then, as though realizing a possible situation in which anyone could take a bit of offense, he rushes to neutralize it. “I mean, I didn’t mean to, like, take off, I just. It was kind of a lot and it sucks because it’s  _ your  _ party and I want to celebrate you but, you know.”

Zoe is just thankful he’s not apologizing - even a few months before, that would’ve been riddled with apologies that he didn’t need to give. “No, I get it. It’s a lot of people, and they’re not even nice, they’re just - my family. There. Being a lot. I’m glad you left when it was too much.” But he doesn’t un-tense, and his fidgeting persists, so she does, too. “I’ve barely had a chance to talk to you today.”

“Well, it’s been busy.”

“I know, but I still feel bad.”

“Don’t,” he says immediately, with a sudden ferocity in the tone she never would’ve expected. His hands still, and he lifts his head from hers to pull back and look her in the eye. “Zoe, please don’t - don’t feel bad for living your life and accomplishing things, okay? Because I’m here even when none of that is happening.”

She blinks once, slowly, and nods a top-to-bottom nod. “Okay,” she says, her eyes flicking over his expression. His lips thin into a line, and it’s then and there that she decides for blunt honesty over anything else. “I don’t - I don’t feel bad for  _ that.  _ I don’t...that wasn’t the right word to use. I just meant that I...I miss you. And it’s stupid because I’ve seen you all day, it’s not like we’re long separated and pining or…” She thinks of the acceptance letter sitting on her desk, the train tickets already booked for mid-July, the textbooks and purple-and-gold paraphernalia she’s yet to buy, and she wonders if the trove of emotion she’s just struck in her own chest is the same one that Evan is feeling. “I’m proud of myself and I’m happy to graduate, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t rather be sitting here and making flower crowns with you.”

Evan shakes his head, a quick, uncertain thing. “I don’t - you can’t mean that.”

“What?” she responds, trying to duck her head to catch his eye, but he won’t look at her. “I mean it. I mean it wholeheartedly. We only have...we only have so much time left. I don’t want to miss it.”

He swallows harshly, and Zoe realizes that this is what was really on his mind. Her departure date for NYU is scheduled for a little over a month later. She reaches for his hand. 

“I know things are changing,” Evan says finally. “And that’s...that’s okay.”

“‘Change is okay,’ said Evan Hansen, never,” Zoe says, only half-joking. 

“No, I...I mean it.”

She raises an eyebrow.

“I’m okay with it,” he says more firmly. “I know it has to happen. I know it’s good. NYU is your dream, Zoe. I’d never dream of not wanting you there. We’re changing along with everything else.”

This time, she’s the one who swallows harshly. “I know we are. I wish that…I wish that you could come with me. I want NYU, but I don’t know if I’ll make it through without you.”

“You will,” he says. “You’re the strongest person I know, Zoe.”

“But-”

“You can - please don’t let me hold you back.”

She stills. “What?”

“I-” Evan looks so different than he did before, so much more uncertain. His hands are fidgeting again, and she reaches over to rub circles into the back of his hand. “I can only think that I could be holding you back. I mean, I’m working at Pottery Barn, the most boring of all stores. Community college is the best I’ll ever do. I don’t know if I, I’m not certain when I’m gonna leave this  _ town.  _ So don’t - I would absolutely  _ hate  _ it if I thought you were waiting for me. It’s the other way around. I’m waiting for you, okay? Because I want you to - to go to NYU, and have the time of your goddamn life. And I just want you to know that I’m always here, no matter how long it is, no matter how much you change. I’ll change with you. I’ll learn. I’ll-”

“Hey,” Zoe says gently to cut him off. She reaches forward to him, and he reaches for her like a little kid clutching a stuffed animal, like someone coming home after years away, like he’s afraid she might disappear. As he buries his face in her neck and her arms tighten around him, she realizes that this is not Evan panic. This is - this is Evan sadness and Evan worry. About  _ her.  _

After stroking his hair for a moment, she speaks. “I promise you, I won’t stop doing things on your account. You have my word. But I’m not going to get up there and forget about you, Evan. I’m going to think about you - probably too many times to be healthy, to be honest, and I’ll force you to Facetime with me at all hours when I’m procrastinating and you’re trying to convince me to just do the damn work, and I’m going to keep loving you and I’m not once going to doubt that you’re still here.”

Evan nods against her shoulder, and she continues. “You’re my North Star, Evan,” she whispers. “I could pick you out from anywhere, and you’ll always be the brightest light I see.”

“You’re the same for me,” he whispers, his breath hot against her skin. 

“I mean it. I’m coming back to you no matter what,” she says, her words low but her tone sharp. “Nothing could stop me from coming home to you.”

He pulls away after another moment and sighs. “We should probably get back in. I know your mother spent weeks planning this.”

“More like planning since I was in elementary school,” she says with a sigh to match Evan’s. As he moves to stand, she reaches out to grab his hand and halt his progress. “Not so fast, though,” she says, tugging him back down towards her. She’s not quite ready to give up  _ this,  _ his skin on hers under the June sun. 

When he just raises an eyebrow, she raises one to match it. “Don’t I get a flower crown?”

His laugh is sudden and bright, an explosion of color against a grey conversation. “Of course,” he says around a wide smile. “It’s your day, after all.”

“Along with the other two-hundred students.”

“Yours and yours alone.”

“Oh,  _ well,  _ if you insist.”

As Evan sits down again and his fingers find purchase with the many small flowers popping up around them, Zoe allows herself to just look at him and be  _ okay.  _ There’s no pressure in their little haven around the tree, and in that comfort she thinks of her words from before.  _ I’ll come home to you.  _

She can’t help but think that the boy across from her is more of a home than the house they sit outside of, and when he presents her with her flower crown and presses a kiss to her cheek, she’s only more certain of it. 

**Author's Note:**

> anyway shoutout to ben platt for existing and creating this song!
> 
> hope everyone is staying healthy and safe <3


End file.
